Screaming Eagles

^FIFTY-SIX COLEY

Coley dove into a building that had been a shop. He hit the floor, and then a massive explosion lifted him off the ground and tossed him like a ragdoll to the hard floor again.

The shelves had been nearly bared of stores. A few tins and bottles still stood, but after the explosion there was nothing on the wall anymore. They fell with a loud crash and broken plates and glass showered Coley.

Von Boeselager had hit the ground next to him. The two men stared at each other as dust settled.

Von Boeselager said something, but Coley’s ears were filled with cotton.

They stumbled out of the building just before it collapsed. Two buildings kitty-corner to him had their corners blown out.

Someone motioned for them to follow. He was dazed and didn’t know what else to do. He breathed a sigh of relief when he found that most of the men he’d been with were still standing, though most were covered in debris.

The explosion had dropped tons of bricks and mortar on a large German force, stopping them in their tracks. Arms twitched where they stuck out of the rubble.

Feeling very much like the enemies they’d been fleeing from, he staggered and made for the half-track, he and von Boeselager holding onto each other for support.

They helped him, von Boeselager, Higgins and Audley, von Boeselager’s men, and the remains of the 99^th Intelligence and Reconnaissance division into the back of the vehicle. The truck lurched into motion, backed up, and turned until it found the road out of town.

Lieutenant Coley and von Boeselager sat across from each other. They were stuffed between a dozen men, and there was a small pair of children sitting on the laps of two men.

“This is a hell of a mixed force we got here. I’m Murph by the way,” a man wearing the insignia of a tanker said.

The men made introductions as they left the confines of the city. Coley was shaken. His back ached from diving into the building and his neck and the back of his head was burned.

“We headed for Assenois?” a tanker named Graves asked.

“Looks like it,” Coley said.

The tankers looked worn out, like they’d spent a week in the field. Both men had days’ worth of stubble, and they didn’t smell that great. Not that Coley expected he and his men smelled anything but ripe. Him especially with the smell of burned hair wouldn’t depart no matter which way the wind blew past the half-track.

“Anyone want to speculate on what in the hell we just faced?” Murphy asked.

“I can offer some information,” von Boeselager said. “Although I do not understand it myself. Many of the men you faced have been subjected to an experimental serum. They were told that it would make them stronger and fast in the offensive. The effects, as you have seen, were disastrous.”

“You’re saying this is some kind of crazy, fucked-up Nazi medicine?” Graves asked.

“Yes. That is all I know,” von Boeselager said. Reluctantly, he reached in the front of his pants.

“Hey now, hoss. We don’t need to see that,” Murph said.

Von Boeselager withdrew a thin slip of paper and handed it to Coley. Coley shook it open and stared at the orders, but they were in German. The other German soldiers exchanged angry words, but von Boeselager talked them down.

“Anyone know any German?” He looked around the faces but no one took up the challenge.

“I will translate,” von Boeselager offered, taking the slip back and reading in a sonorous voice.

“Regimental Order Number 54, dated 16 December 1944. The Daily Order of the Supreme Commander West. Soldiers, your hour has come…”